i8 HUNTING. 



long been common in the Royal Hunt, but was then an innova- 

 tion. This gallant beast was taken in ' Burleigh's Pond,' as we 

 see in an accompanying engravmg, but reserved for a future 

 occasion. So far all may have been well enough, but the 

 chronicler, unfortunately for his cause, is a little too minute in 

 his details. Not only were booths for refreshment erected at 

 the place of meeting, but, after the proper sport of the day was 

 over, a ' genteel marquee ' was pitched, appropriately enough 

 near an inn known as 'The Bald-Faced Stag,' wherein a lady, 

 'elegantly dressed ' in a riding-habit, and with 'a bewitching 

 face and fascinating address,' presided over sundry E.O. tables. 

 To turn again to our bibliography, in the seventeenth 

 century we find a great improvement. Gervase Markham's 

 'Country Contentments,' and Richard Blome's 'Gentleman's 

 Recreation,' are not only intelligible enough for any reader, but 

 also extremely useful and practical ; so that Beckford's saying is 

 itself intelligible only on the supposition that he was unaware 

 of their existence. Markham was the son of a Nottinghamshire 

 squire, and a man of many pursuits and accomplishments. He 

 was a soldier, a poet, and a playwright, as well as a sportsman 

 and farmer. It was in his latter capacities, however, that he won 

 most fame. His treatises on horsemanship and sport were 

 once highly esteemed, but it appears that he soon ' wrote 

 himself out,' and his method of producing quasi new books 

 was to repeat what he had said in his old ones, the con- 

 sequence being that he was finally forced to sign an under- 

 taking to write no more. Of Blome, or Bloome, we know 

 less. There is a man of that name very roughly handled 

 in the ' Athenae Oxonienses ' for pirating an edition of Bare- 

 ham's ' Display of Heraldry.' He is described by Wood as 

 ' a kind of arms painter (originally a ruler of paper, and now 

 a scribbler of books), who hath since practised for divers years 

 progging tricks in employing necessitous persons to write in 

 several arts, and to get contributions of noblemen to promote 

 the work.' Blome's book was certainly published by sub- 

 scription, one of the editions containing the coats-of-arms of 

 the various subscribers. It also includes a treatise on heraldry, 



